Royal Enfield Himalayan coming to Europe

ROYAL Enfield is to show its Himalayan adventure bike in Europe for the first time next week, a strong indication that the Indian firm plans to sell it here too.

The 411cc single was launched in India in February but Royal Enfield said at the time that initial plans were to sell it there only.

Now that looks set to change following confirmation the model will be presented at next week’s Eicma motorcycle show in Milan, Italy, by Royal Enfield boss Siddhartha Lal.

A Royal Enfield source said: “Siddhartha Lal will showcase the new Himalayan to a European audience for the first time” at a press conference at 3pm on Wednesday.

The Himalayan makes 24hp and 23lbft and weighs 182kg.

Some may remember it from the promo video which Royal Enfield withdrew after keen-eyed viewers spotted a peg snapping off as the bike landed following a jump, a moment captured in the still image below.

A Royal Enfield spokesman said at the time that the bike shown was a prototype. Let’s give it a second chance, eh.

I saw the machine at RE North America HQ opening in September. It is a very workmanlike design. If you are an "adventure bike"type, it is worth looking into. For me however, I want that updated Interceptor and/or Constellation soon.

It's made of Indian scrap iron, build quality is Turd World, not even Third World (just read the forums for the litany of issues).If they manage to get it through homologation it's because they've bought somebody off, and at `24 hp` and `182 Kg` it's 20 hp light and 20 kilo heavy.

If it's £1,800 its value for money. Any more than that and nah, it's not. Used DR400 with a rebuild and some addon parts will be all over it.